The planet’s survival depends on water, and it is our collective responsibility to steward it for our future generations. As a company that is highly cognizant of its operations, Nestlé Pakistan prioritizes the responsible management of water resources as part of our larger sustainability efforts. Given the deficiencies in the agricultural sector’s water management systems, rapid population growth, and climate change resulting in floods and droughts, protecting this precious resource in the country is an issue that needs immediate attention.
We also recognize that the long-term success of Nestlé depends on sustainable supply of water in the locations from where our raw materials are sourced, our factories operate in and our communities live.
This is why we are taking the following actions to ensure there’s enough water for everyone, today, tomorrow and for generations to come. We ensure all our interventions are in line with the Sustainable Development Goals.
Taking collective action
Given our size and scale, we are cognizant of Nestlé’s unique position in promoting sustainable water solutions. However, despite our ambitious commitments and the determination of our teams, Pakistan’s shared water challenges need collective action for sustainable solutions. Through our experience, we have come to understand that working in isolation will not result in scalable long-lasting impacts.
To overcome this hurdle, our flagship Caring for Water-Pakistan (C4W-Pakistan) that started in 2017, has made us a lighthouse market within Nestlé.
C4W-Pakistan serves as a platform to foster collective action and bring diverse but relevant stakeholders together to deliberate on and find solutions to Pakistan’s existing water challenges. As a result of this, we have undertaken several activities under three overarching pillars for C4W-Pakistan: Agriculture, Factories, and Communities.
Setting ambitious targets
Embracing our role as responsible water stewards, we launched our Waters Pledge in 2021. Under this commitment, our Waters Business has committed to lead the regeneration of the water cycle to create a positive water impact everywhere it operates by 2025. The Waters Pledge builds on our C4W-Pakistan initiatives.
Leading from the front
Nestlé looks to lead by example, seeking to serve a greater good as the global leader in water sustainability. Our commitment towards responsible water resource management is demonstrated from the fact that Nestlé Pakistan’s Sheikhupura Factory became the first site in Pakistan and the first Nestlé site worldwide to be awarded the Alliance for Water Stewardship (AWS) certification in 2017. The AWS certification is an international standard for freshwater resources that guides organizations to manage water by taking site and catchment relevant initiatives through stakeholder inclusive processes.
Our factories in Islamabad, Kabirwala, and Karachi were certified in 2018, 2019, and 2020 respectively. We are the first market in the Nestlé world to have all our sites certified by the AWS standard.
Advancing local solutions through partnerships
As a global company that understands the significant of local solutions for local challenges, we have deployed various localized solutions to drive our sustainability efforts.
One major challenge is water wastage within the agriculture sector in Pakistan. According to the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), over 90% of Pakistan’s water resources are used for agriculture. A whopping 50% of this water is wasted due to mismanagement.
Therefore, it does not come as a surprise that the biggest impact we strive to make in achieving our Waters Pledge is making relevant interventions in the agriculture sector. The approach that we use is collaborating with local stakeholders to develop localized solutions.
Our collaboration with the Centre for Water Informatics & Technology (WIT) at the Lahore University of Management Sciences (LUMS), led us to develop low-cost smart soil moisture sensors together. These sensors read the moisture level of the soil and send regular data updates to a cloud updating farmers by identifying the areas they should irrigate and how much. Additionally, a software has been developed as part of the initiative that lets farmers and researchers access the information remotely. In 2023, smart soil sensors were operational on 548 acres.
Another technological intervention facilitated by Nestlé is enabling local farmers to adopt drip irrigation instead of conventional flood irrigation practices. So far, Nestlé has supported the installation of drip irrigation over 300 acres of farmland with over 210 acres in Sindh alone.
To showcase best irrigation practices to academia, as well as public, private and development sector practitioners, Nestlé has established demonstration sites in collaboration with the Pakistan Agriculture and Research Council (PARC), and the University of Veterinary and Animal Sciences (UVAS) Pattoki. We believe that knowledge-sharing, and peer-learning is the approach we need to embrace in ensuring a sustainable world for our future generations.
Ensuring communities are at the heart of our sustainability efforts
Within the communities where we operate, we have successfully established 8 Clean and Safe Drinking Water Facilities. These facilities ensure that over 80,000 individuals have free daily access to clean and safe drinking water.
The sustainable management of water resources is a colossal task, but through collective action, we are confident we will be able to achieve it.
In Commitment with
